Heart of the Thief (The Wardbreaker Book 1)

by Katerina Martinez

I walked back over to the starting position, charging a little magic inside of me as I went. Thunder grumbled in the sky above. The wind circling around the court intensified, kicking up a small whirlwind of autumn leaves around us.

  “You ready for this?” I asked, “Because I don’t think you know who you’re dealing with.”

  RJ stared at me, his eyes low and focused. “Who taught you how to talk smack?” he asked.

  “Like with most other things, I’m self-taught.”

  “You better go get you a tutor, then, ‘cause that was weak as hell.”

  I frowned, and he threw the ball at me. This time when I caught it, I released the spell I’d been charging inside of myself. All it took was a moment of concentration and a call to the Tempest, and the wind around us became mine to control.

  I feinted to the right, then darted to the left. RJ was fast enough to keep up with me, but when I gently nudged the ball to go around him, he wasn’t fast enough to grab it before I’d gotten to it. I raced toward the hoop, leapt into the air, and the wind carried me all the way to the hoop. When I dunked the ball, thunder roared, as if the heavens themselves were cheering me on.

  A rowdy chorus of “oh shit!” and “damn!” rang out from the side of the court as I dropped down from the hoop. By the look on RJ’s face, the game was well and truly on. We went at it another couple of rounds, each of us using subtle amounts of magic to help give us an edge over the other.

  It went against the Magus Codice—the mage’s book of laws—to use magic in front of humans. But as long as they didn’t know they were seeing magic at work, the Legionnaires weren’t going to waste their time on you.

  Even with my magical edge, RJ won the game. It was his raw skill over mine that tipped the balance in his favor. If I was being honest with myself, I’d expected he would beat me in a one-on-one, but this was never about winning. It was about getting a chance to connect with him again. It was clear he hadn’t forgiven me for what had happened to his sister, and that was fine. I hadn’t either.

  But maybe now that we’d had a chance to put some of the frustration away, he’d feel a little better about talking to me. It was the best I could hope for. At the same time, I wasn’t going to push it. RJ was the kind of guy who never did anything he didn’t want to do. I needed him to want to talk to me.

  After the game was over, I walked over to him, tidying the wild mess my hair had become. “Good game,” I said. “Remind me never to challenge you again.”

  “I’m not gonna have to,” he said, “You’re losing my number, remember?”

  I turned my eyes up at him, keeping my expression soft. “Look, I know we made a deal, but I just want to know if your sister is okay.”

  “She’s fine.”

  “What happened that night—”

  “—I don’t wanna talk about it.”

  One of RJ’s friends picked the basketball up and started dribbling it around, occasionally taking shots at the hoop.

  I nodded. “I understand that… and I’m just gonna come out and say it. I need your help.”

  He gave me a hard look. “Lose my number, alright? And don’t come around here again. It won’t be good for you.”

  “RJ, please—” he went to turn away from me, but I reached for his arm.

  He batted my hand aside and jabbed a finger at me. “Don’t,” he warned, “Alright? I ain’t playing with you. The last time I helped you out, I almost lost someone. Why should I do it again?”

  “Trust me, I know full well what happened that night was mostly my fault. All I want is a chance to talk about it. You don’t know the whole story.”

  “I know enough. Trouble follows you around, Izzy. I don’t got time to be following you around, too—we’ve got enough problems of our own out here.”

  I was running out of cards to play. I knew he needed money. Telling him about the payoff we were gonna get for pulling off Asmodius’ job would probably get him to listen a little more patiently. But it would also make him question everything, and I wasn’t sure RJ would be as comfortable with the idea of working for a crime lord as Danvers was.

  The fact of the matter was, the only card I could play was the honesty card. I had to tell him the truth.

  The crows moved in a little closer, fluttering over our heads to settle on one of the nearest withered trees. I watched them fly, swallowing hard, considering what I was about to do. While the birds were still trying to settle, I pushed a gust of wind over in their direction, knocking them off their perch. Then I grabbed him and pressed my lips against his ear.

  “I’m in some deep shit,” I said, “I can’t talk about it right now, but you’re one of the only people I trust who can help me.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” RJ asked. He’d tried to pull away, but I kept him close to me.

  “They caught up with me. Asmodius and his people. They want me to do something I don’t want to do, but I don’t have a choice. If I’m gonna make it out of this alive, I need you. Please. I’ll do whatever you ask me to do.”

  I kept pushing the wind against the birds for as long as I could, for as long as it took RJ to make up his mind. It felt like a lifetime, my heart hammering with each passing second. I thought about that night, thought about the way his sister had been struck by a stray bolt of magic that had been meant for me. I remembered the way her eyes rolled into the back of her skull, the way her fingers bent until her bones snapped, the way she screamed from the pain.

  I shut my eyes tight. A tear rolled down my cheek.

  “Fine,” he said, “But after this, we’re done.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The crows fluttered down from the trees in an angry frenzy, blocking my way to the car as I crossed the street. Karkov’s face was all hard lines and swollen veins. Delia’s hair was a frazzled mess she struggled to control even after the wind had died down. She blew her hair out of her face and stared at me from where she stood.

  “You,” she yelled, pointing her fingers me. “You did that, didn’t you?”

  “Did what?” I asked, shrugging.

  “Don’t play coy with me, little witch. You tried to knock us off our perch, didn’t you?” She cocked her hand back like she was about to hurl a bolt of magic at me, but RJ stepped between us.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he warned. Clearly the fact that two crows had just revealed themselves to be mages hadn’t fazed him, but I wasn’t surprised by that. It was hard to catch him off guard. That was one of the reasons why I wanted him on my team.

  “Careful,” Delia said in a low voice, “Be very careful. Remember, we have your friend in the car. You start a fight with us, and maybe you don’t see her again.”

  “Will everybody just cool it?” I said, “I don’t care what you say, I’m not responsible for your inability to fly straight.”

  “The girl lies,” Karkov put in; unhelpfully, I might add. “Girl used wind to be better at sports. Why not use wind to make us lose balance?”

  “I don’t know if you’ve been listening, but we’re all on the same team. As much as I would love to make you look like total asshats, I value the spirit of camaraderie more.”

  Delia gawked at me. “Come on,” she said, slouching her stance and rolling her eyes, “Not even you believe that crap.”

  “What’s going on here?” came Axel’s voice from across the street. He’d stepped out of the car and had moved around the front.

  “You know these clowns?” RJ asked.

  “They work for me, yes.”

  “Then tell them to watch their step around me and my girl, here. They’re out of their league.”

  “Is that so?”

  RJ rolled his substantial shoulders. “Yeah. It’s so.”

  Axel stared at him, one eyebrow cocked, his lips slightly curled. “You two can go,” he said, “I’ve got this under control.”

  “Go?” Delia protested, “She messed with us!”

  “Or you both made a mistake. It happens.
Don’t make me order you a second time.”

  The crows frowned, but did as they were told. Simultaneously they turned their chins up to the grey sky, and instantly transformed into black birds that quickly pulled away with the breeze. It was a hell of a thing to watch. The synchronicity, the precision. Sure, they were little more than henchmen—henchmen I enjoyed pissing off—but they were also strong mages I would do well not to underestimate.

  “So,” I called out to Axel, “How about we talk in the car?”

  Without skipping a beat, Axel turned to his side and gestured to the black sedan waiting for us on the other side of the road. RJ had no idea what he’d just been roped into, but to his credit, he didn’t question it. He had decided to trust me, despite what had happened to his sister on my watch. I couldn’t tell him how much I appreciated him right now.

  The backseat was already little too tight with RJ, Danvers, and myself occupying it, but we made do. I did my best to fill RJ in once we’d started moving, and while I’d essentially told him we were about to do something incredibly dangerous—not to mention illegal—he didn’t flinch from it. I’d given him enough subtext in the whispered plea I’d been able to drop at his doorstep that he understood what was needed of him.

  He needed to play ball, at least for now, so he didn’t put up a fight. He also didn’t say much. I didn’t think that was a problem. In fact, it was probably helpful. It added to the lion lying in wait aura he exuded. An aura that would hopefully remind Axel that I’d picked dangerous people to bring to the team, and that he was no longer the top dog.

  “Now…” Axel said, after a lull in my conversation with RJ, “Where should I instruct my driver to take us so we can round up the last member of your team?”

  “Here’s the thing about my last pick,” I said. “Number one, we don’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of finding him until nightfall. Probably not until after midnight. And number two, I have no way of contacting him, and that also means I don’t have any way of letting him know I’m coming to see him.”

  Axel shut his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Do you have someone else in mind that we could round your team off with? We’re on a time limit.”

  “Are we? Because I haven’t been given one yet.”

  “I was going to save this for the official briefing, but this job needs to be done in exactly a week.”

  “A week?” I would’ve spat out my drink if I’d been drinking at the time. “Wait a second, you want us to crack Eliphas’ vault in a week? How does that give us enough time to do… anything?”

  “You said you could do it, so I’m holding you to your word.”

  “I can do it, but I need time to prepare, first. This is the Magister you’re talking about. I need time to do my due diligence, otherwise this whole operation has to be carried out on a wing and a prayer, and that’s a sure-fire way to get us all killed—or worse.”

  “What’s worse than being killed?” Danvers asked.

  “There’s worse things,” RJ said, keeping his voice low. He didn’t add anything else, but he didn’t have to. Stories of the way the Magistrate dealt with mages who broke the Magus Codice weren’t exactly rare or hidden from the general public. The Magistrate liked to rule using fear as both a collar and a leash, because when you were governing beings who could literally remake the world with their fingertips, that was the only thing that worked.

  I shook my head. “Alright, what happens in a week?” I asked, “Why is that the time limit?”

  “Eliphas’ vault is located in penthouse,” Axel said, “And in a week, he’ll be hosting an All Hallows Eve event for some of his nearest and dearest.”

  I stared at him. “Please don’t tell me your father is a close enough friend of the Magister to get an invite.”

  “My father doesn’t only exert a powerful hold on New York, he is also one of the city’s most prominent mages, and a supporter of the Magistrate as a governing body.”

  “Except he’s stealing from them, so… how does that work?”

  “The Magister has been sitting on artefacts that belong not to him, but to all of us. The drowned queen built a city that was meant to be a utopia for our kind. A place for knowledge, and peace. A place free from crime and strife and squalor. My father, and many like him, believe the secret to building another such city lives on inside of her artefacts.”

  “And you believe that drivel too?”

  Axel frowned. “It’s not drivel. I don’t expect you to understand.”

  “We’re all pretty intelligent people here,” Danvers put in, “How about you try us?”

  He paused before speaking again, taking a short breath to center himself. “We all thought those artefacts had been destroyed centuries ago, but if the coins exist, then so do they, and they belong to all of us.”

  I screwed my face up. “Something tells me your father isn’t hiring me to run a heist on the Magister’s vault for altruistic reasons, but I’m tired of arguing about this. You’re telling me his vault is in his penthouse, and that you can get us all inside… is that right?”

  “As guests, yes.”

  “Well, in that case, I’d say we have a shot at pulling this off. A week is still one hell of a time constraint. I’m gonna need a lot more freedom than what you’re giving me right now. I’m also gonna need tools, access to blueprints—”

  “—and food,” Danvers added, “And booze. And maybe a couple of the things on this list.” She handed a piece of paper over to Axel.

  After he read it, he looked up at her. “What is all this stuff?”

  “Pretty sure you just said we’re gate-crashing a party, right?”

  “You aren’t gate-crashing, you’ll be guests.”

  “Whatever. That changes the paradigm a little, so I’ll need the items on that list.”

  Axel read the list again. “And where am I supposed to get chameleon tears from?”

  Danvers shrugged. “That sounds like a you kinda problem. Right? I mean, it’s not like you’re gonna let me go out and look for them myself, and I need them for my work.”

  “Do chameleons even cry?” RJ asked.

  “Good question,” Danvers said, a smug smile planted on her face.

  I grinned at her. She was screwing with Axel. Chameleon tears? That was some fresh bullshit meant to give Axel a headache, nothing more. “Alright,” I said, “Look, even if the stuff on that list is found, we need our fifth, and that’s still gonna be a problem for two reasons.”

  Axel sighed and pocketed Danvers’ list. “Okay… what are they?”

  “First, he’s really jittery, so I’d wanna go find him on my own.”

  “Out of the question. I let you go on your own last time. This time, I go with you.”

  Pick your battles, Izzy. I nodded. “Alright… fine.”

  “What’s the other problem?”

  I considered answering, about revealing the second problem, but I thought better of it and shook my head. “You know what, don’t worry about it. There are three places he’s likely to be tonight, so we’ll have to check them all out. But trust me… once we get close enough to him, he’ll come out of wherever he’s hiding. He won’t be able to help himself.”

  Axel’s eyes narrowed. “Oh? And why’s that?”

  I shrugged. “Just a hunch.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “Come in,” called a voice from beyond the door.

  Axel took a deep breath, straightened his tie, and turned the handle. The room he stepped into was a like a shrine to mahogany itself, the colors dark and rich, the air thick with the scent of wood and whiskey. Despite the size of the room, deep browns and blacks swallowed the light breaking through the windows, making the shadows loom longer and more imposingly than they would have otherwise.

  Sitting at an obnoxiously huge desk was Asmodius, reading a dossier of information with one hand while swirling a drink in the other. He had time to drink deeply of his cup and set it down on a coaster before Axel made it to
the desk from the door.

  Axel watched his father from where he stood, his hands held firmly behind his back, his posture proud. He waited, and waited, and waited, a practice he’d gotten used to over the last ten years of his life. He couldn’t speak, he couldn’t sit; he had to wait until his father was ready to speak. Otherwise… well, there wasn’t an otherwise.

  Not since the first and only time he fell out of line.

  Asmodius turned his clear eyes up at his son, flashing as they caught a stray ray of sunlight. “I expected you seven minutes ago,” he said.

  “My apologies,” Axel said, “I wanted to make sure the mansion’s security wasn’t compromised with the arrival of our guests.”

  “And is it?”

  “No. They have been confined to quarters. Armed Tempests have been posted at their doors to keep them from using magic while inside.”

  “Good.” He turned his eyes to his dossier again for a moment before setting the file down. “Give me a report on what happened today.”

  Axel took another deep breath. “She requested three others for her team. So far, she has two of them.”

  “And the third?”

  “Tonight. I will personally accompany her and make sure things run smoothly.”

  Asmodius paused, took a sip of his drink. “Her abilities?”

  “Tested, and confirmed. She disabled a ward for me earlier today.”

  “And you know this because… she told you?”

  “I hadn’t been able to spot the ward at first, but when she pointed it out, it became apparent that it was there. Then she disabled it, and I couldn’t sense it anymore.”

  “So, it’s true, then…”

  “That’s what it looks like to me. Perhaps you should test her yourself, you could set up a ward tonight before we return and see if she cracks it.”

  Asmodius cocked an eyebrow. “Are you telling me what to do, now?”

  Axel stiffened. “No, sir. I merely thought—”

  “—don’t think. There’s no need for you to think while you’re in my presence.”

  A moment passed, one pregnant with tension and unease. Axel’s heart started to hammer hard against his chest. He tried to slow it down, tried to will it under control before his father caught a whiff of what Axel was feeling. He told himself he wasn’t scared of his father, that his father would never treat him like he would one of his hired hands.